


Handle With Care

by inlovewithnight



Category: Bandom, Cobra Starship, Gym Class Heroes
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-10
Updated: 2012-02-10
Packaged: 2017-10-30 22:09:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 858
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/336678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inlovewithnight/pseuds/inlovewithnight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for Porn Battle 13, prompt "gently."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Handle With Care

It's always the same, has been since back in the day, since they were punk-ass kids who thought they were kings. They finish up at the club or the bar or the party--wherever they were making the scene--and they slip off together, walking back to wherever they were going to be alone.

Back then it was Trav's shitty apartment, then Gabe's shitty apartment--then buses and shitty hotel rooms--now it's fucking comped suites. They've arrived. Kings after all.

What they do is the same, though. They sit--side by side, on couch or bed or, back in the day, the floor--and they smoke. Travis provides the stash, because Gabe's is never good enough, and Gabe rolls, slow and careful. And they smoke, matching breath to breath in silence.

The Twin Towers, people called them, back in the day. They walked into a room and stood out like that. And then they would own the room, because--because--well, because why wouldn't they, when all eyes were already on them?

They smoke, fingers brushing together as they pass the joint back and forth, until finally Travie catches Gabe's chin, tilts his face, and presses their mouths together, breathing smoke into him. Gabe always reacts the same, eyes closing and breath hitching, body swaying into Travie like he needs something to lean on. And Travie laughs--he always laughs--, his fingers tighten against Gabe's jaw, and he kisses him.

Gabe thinks he could sit and kiss like that forever, barely moving, just the slightest rock back and forth as they trade who's in control. That's the thing about them, the thing maybe nobody else gets, nobody else sees; neither one of them's ever on top, ever in charge. It's back and forth always. Co-kings. Both in charge.

Or maybe they're just both stubborn assholes with fucked-up masculinity complexes who can't ever really let go. Gabe doesn't care, and he'd bet money that Trav doesn't, either. It doesn't matter, when they do this.

After a while, just a few minutes after Gabe starts to feel a little bit dizzy, when the world starts going blurry at the edges, Travie sighs and turns his head, his lips sliding dry and soft against Gabe's cheek. "Hey, brother," he murmurs, letting his fingers walk slowly down Gabe's arm to his wrist, hovering over the pulse there. "You want?"

It's an unfinished question, and Gabe fills in the blanks, nodding and stretching out his legs if he has to, shifting around to let Travie guide his hand. Gentle touches, clumsy from the smoke, fumbling buttons and zippers and working layer by layer until skin meets skin. They kiss again, a little more intense now, because you've gotta be more intense when there's a hand on your dick, and it's warm and strong and belongs to a guy you know like you know yourself. Who's known you ever since it mattered.

Gabe's drawn it out more than once, on napkins and notepads and the backs of copies of riders. It's a net, a web; the connections that tie their little clique together. The names change sometimes, falling off the edges and being replaced, but the middle line is always the same.

Nobody else really draws that line much. There's Pete and Travis, with their shared tattoos and their epiphany nights. Travis and William, pressed up close under stage lights, and drunk nights that turn into "Naked Peekaboo." William and Gabe, the long drawn-out dance, come-here-go-away until neither of them could breathe. And Gabe and Pete, holding hands through nuclear fallout and computer screens.

Nobody draws the line between Gabe and Travis but themselves. That's fine as far as Gabe's concerned; keeping it out of the lights makes it a little more precious. Something that's just his, that he can keep in his pocket for the cold moments.

Travie shifts in closer and Gabe leans back, lifting up his hips so Trav's fingers can wrap around him better, tighter. Travie's knuckles press against the base of Gabe's balls and Gabe makes himself breathe slower, shallower, so he won't betray himself with a whine. It's good with Travie, always good. Even when they were both fucked-up beyond belief they were good together. The line between them never moved. There's no fear of crossing a line when you know where it's always going to be.

Neither of them was there for the other's rock-bottom, and neither of them left fingerprints on the thing that gave the other his crown. They caught each other's slides, though, and boosted the uphill climb. What they've got is in the in-between. 

Travis comes with a rough little gasp when Gabe's teeth catch his lower lip. His hand tightens and Gabe loses himself, too. They rest their foreheads together and they breathe, they close their eyes for one last clumsy kiss, they ease away and wipe their hands on each other's jeans.

Travie passes the stash and Gabe rolls again, his fingers even slower now, like he's performing a sacrament. They sit. They smoke. When they catch each other's eye, they laugh. Kings of the world. They never doubted it.


End file.
